Abstract
Using the provincial panel data of China during 2012–2019, the present study employed spatial Durbin error model to explore the spatial effect of the digital economy on energy intensity. The results show that both digital economy and energy intensity have spatial autocorrelation, showing the distribution characteristics of spatial aggregation. The digital economy has a significant negative influence on energy intensity. The result shows a significant spatial spillover effect of digital economy on energy intensity, and the development of the digital economy in neighboring regions reduces energy intensity in the central region. Additionally, industrial structure, urbanization, energy price, and foreign direct investment have a heterogenous impact on energy intensity. Thus, it is crucial to give importance to the development of the energy intensity, plan the spatial layout of the digital industry as a whole, drive the coordinated growth of the regional digital economy, quicken the upgrading of industrial structure, promote urbanization, perfect the energy price formation mechanism, raise the entry threshold for foreign direct investment, to effectively reduce the energy intensity, and facilitate the smooth realization of the “double carbon” goal.
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The data used to support the findings of this study is available from the corresponding author upon request.
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Funding
The research is supported by the Xinjiang Social Science Project “An economic history study on the influence of industrial structure distortion on Xinjiang’s energy intensity (1949–2020)” (22BJL017) and Xinjiang University Doctoral Research Start-Up Fund Project “Study on the influence of industrial structure distortion on energy intensity in Xinjiang (1978–2021)”(620321035).
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QG, ZW, AJ, CD, BG, AA: conceptualization, methodology, software, validation, formal analysis, investigation, data curation, writing — original draft, writing — review and editing. AJ, BG: conceptualization, methodology, software, validation, formal analysis, data curation, writing — original draft, writing — review and editing, supervision. AJ: validation, writing — review and editing, supervision; AJ, BG, AA: validation, writing — review and editing.
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Guo, Q., Wu, Z., Jahanger, A. et al. The spatial impact of digital economy on energy intensity in China in the context of double carbon to achieve the sustainable development goals. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 35528–35544 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-24814-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-24814-8